The Pygmy Giant

by Natalia Godsmark

It’s done now. I hope you’re proud of yourself. I may have dug in the knife, but you drove me to it. We’re in this together now, you and me.

His unblinking eyes are fixed on the window just behind me.

“What are we going to do?” you ask, and your voice is shaking, almost like you wish I hadn’t done it.

“Calm down,” I say. “This is why we’re here. We’ll dig a hole. Bury him.”

“And then what?”

“And then… we carry on.”

“What do you mean ‘carry on’? How do we ‘carry on’?”

“We go back to the flat and act like nothing happened. If anyone asks, you haven’t seen him since Saturday. Understand?”

“But his phone?”

“I threw his phone in the bin at that drive-thru MacDonald’s.”

“What? I thought…”

“You thought what? That I just fancied some chicken nuggets after slicing up your boyfriend?”

“He’s not my boyfriend.”

“He isn’t anymore… Come on.”

I push my shovel into the hard earth and we are silent. It’s not like on the telly; digging a six-foot hole takes a long time. The smell of wet soil hangs around me and the deeper I dig, the colder it gets. There is mud in my boots, under my fingernails, on my jacket.

At last, we’ve done it.

“You grab his legs.” I say and you whimper as you struggle under his weight.

We throw the body into the hole and begin to cover it. The muscles in my arms are aching, but it’ll be over soon.

“Should we make a note of where we are?”

“Why would we do that?” It amazes me how stupid you can be sometimes. “I suggest we forget everything about tonight and move on.”

Without a word, you wipe your shovel and strip down to your underwear. You put on clean clothes and slam the boot shut. You seem angry.

“I did it for you.” My voice is low, and you don’t respond.

We keep moving. I drive us to the scrapyard and hand over a wad of money for the car to be crushed. No questions are asked. No one looks in the boot.

“I fancy a tea,” I say, “There’ll be a café open by the station.”

You say nothing, and I reach into my handbag to pull out my compact mirror. My face is clean; there is nothing on it to suggest I’ve done anything out of the ordinary today.

“I’m still waiting,” I say, staring into those eyes.

“What for?” you snap.

I can’t believe I have to say it. “For a thank you.”

There is a silence.

“Thank me,” I reply.

–

Natalia Godsmark recently resigned from her day job as a Compliance Officer in an Asset Management organisation (but is a much more interesting person than that makes her sound). This is her first publication.